Survival
by Mochirella
Summary: The Dursleys take Harry on a multi-week trip to the Caribbean just before he turns eleven. After getting shipwrecked, they land on an island that hides some dark secrets. Will Harry be able to survive and escape the island or will he be forced to stay there? -TRANSLATION OF ÜBERLEBENSKAMPF-
1. Prologue

This is the English version of my German Fanfic 'Überlebenskampf', translated my myself. English isn't my first language, and this isn't beta-read.

 **Prologue**

The cruise ship was making good progress, the weather was nice and the guests were relaxing on the chairs on deck. They were returning to their home harbour, the journey was almost over now.  
Harry was on deck too, observing the calm ocean, a few birds trying to steal food and his cousin stuffing himself with ice cream.  
Harry wasn't quite sure why the Dursleys had even bothered taking him with them on this trip, but they probably didn't want to impose on Mrs. Figg. 'I'm not a spring chicken anymore', was what the woman would say if asked about her age, but Harry thought to himself that she must be getting quite old. Her hair was almost white now and she had trouble walking.  
Leaving Harry alone in Privet Drive was also not an option, since Vernon and Petunia always said they wanted their house to still be standing whenever he suggested staying there. He didn't know why they believed he was a pyromaniac...  
In the end, they decided to let Harry come with them on this trip. The tickets were a coupon for four people anyway, so they didn't have to spend any extra money on him.

It was getting dark, but Harry stayed outside while most other passengers went back below deck, either to return to their cabins or to eat something in the big cafeteria.  
Harry was staring into the distance. He thought he'd seen a silhouette of an island there earlier. That was supposed to be impossible, since he had seen a map of the area when he had visited the navigator.  
But the island was there, surrounded by fog that looked almost like a dark, sinister aura. Harry's gut told him that this wasn't good and his gut was always right. The ship was approaching the island. It was getting darker and he could barely make out the shape.  
He went back to his cabin, but sleeping simply wasn't coming to him. Every time he tried, his uneasy feeling came back full force.  
Some time during the night a storm descended upon the ship as well, shaking Harry awake from his dozing.  
Harry ran outside. His suspicions were correct – the dark silhouette of the island was towering over him.  
The ship was swaying harder now and a big wave washed over the deck. Harry barely had enough time to cling to the railing and avoid going over board.  
But a few seconds later, that was exactly what happened. Another, even bigger wave crashed over him and Harry was plummeting down towards the ocean.  
He was not the only one, more and more people emerged from the waves all around him, fighting to stay afloat.  
Harry had always been a decent swimmer in school, but the restricting clothing and rough sea made the hundred or so metres between him and the beach look like an impossible journey. He did, in the end, manage to drag himself onto the beach. Everywhere around him were old ship wrecks, some of them looking like they were hundreds of years old!  
It seemed that crashes like this were a regular occurrence around here... But that also meant that there was a good chance that there were other survivors on this island. It was weird that no one had ever tried to rescue them.  
But Harry had bigger worries. He was soaked to the bone and even if it was July he was freezing and the icy wind certainly didn't help to keep him warm.  
Harry was one of the first people arriving at the beach and he searched for a shelter near the shore. He certainly didn't want to miss the arrival of the others, because he definitely didn't want to be left alone while the others searched for civilisation!  
Harry got lucky and found a small cave. The opening was overgrown with vines and tall grass and would shield him from the weather. The hole was barely big enough for Harry to curl up in, but he managed.

Harry didn't know it at the time, but this cave and his instinct had just saved his life...


	2. Chapter 1

_July_ _30_ _th_ _1991, Hogwarts_

"How is it possible that Mr. Potter has not received any of his letters? The owls either came back with the unopened letters or have vanished completely! This can't go on any longer, we have to do something!", Minerva McGonagall ranted, obviously worried about Harry.  
After Harry hadn't responded to his first Hogwarts letter, the staff had simply assumed he had no way of doing so, since he lived with muggles who didn't own a post owl and some Hogwarts owls had the tendency to simply taking off right after delivering the letters. But even after strictly instructing the next owls to wait for his response, they returned without any letters.  
"Maybe we should send a teacher to see if everything is alright with Harry" Minerva pondered. She was seriously concerned about her future student's well-being. She was aware how much Vernon and Petunia Dursley detested magic and suspected the family was trying to keep Harry away from the school on purpose.

Severus Snape also knew of Petunia's strong dislike of anything magical, but he didn't think it necessary at all to lift a finger for the Potter brat. Why should the kid get any special treatment for being rude anyway?  
Even Albus was relaxed and thought the situation not concerning at all. "Maybe the Durlseys decided to go on a little vacation and took Harry with them. We should just wait until the first day of school until we do anything, he'll surely appear."  
"But Albus, we can't simply wait and do nothing!"  
Albus patted Minerva's shoulder with a sympathetic smile and said. "WE can't do much, but tomorrow, we can try one last time, if that is what you want."

 _same night, Caribbean_

Harry had passed out from sheer exhaustion some time during the night, but about an hour later he woke to loud screaming coming from the beach. Hesitantly, he peeked through the vines and grass that were hiding him from the harsh wind.  
The scene in front of him was horrifying and had burned itself into Harry's memories within seconds. The beach was covered in corpses, their blood seeping into the sand. A few were still alive, but group of people dressed in black slaughtered them within minutes. They let a couple live, young men and women, and dragged them along, deeper into the island.  
They just left the dead bodies on the beach like garbage.

Harry was in shock. On the one hand, he simply couldn't believe humans were capable of something like this, on the other hand, he was surprised by his own emotions.  
He didn't grieve for these people. He didn't know most of them and the Dursleys had never liked him anyway. The feeling was mutual.  
Instead, his body was feeling like it was going numb, his emotions were pushed aside.  
His thoughts were even more surprising.  
Instead of panicking, Harry's mind was completely calm and rational. He knew instinctively that he couldn't fall prey to these black figures, since that was most definitely a death sentence. Harry's survival instincts were taking over.  
He had to find somewhere to hide and then find a way to survive.  
Even though it was disgusting, Harry decided to search the corpses for some usable items. Anything that could help him survive was important and he knew that there was a high probability that at least one of the people had carried a knife.  
Harry worked systematically and tried to avoid looking into people's faces. Some didn't show any outward injuries, they had most likely drowned. Still, he felt like he couldn't bare looking these people in the face without either bursting into tears or throwing up.  
The last bodies he checked were the Dursleys, Aunt Petunia first. But just as Harry crouched down next to her, he realized that she was still alive.  
She was doing quite well, in fact. After sitting up, she asked her nephew: "How is it possible that they didn't get you?" "I found a hiding spot after swimming here", Harry whispered back. Petunia nodded, then let her gaze wander over to the bodies of her husband and son. Tears filled her eyes as she addressed Harry once again: "I'm a good actor, I just pretended to have drowned as soon as I saw what was going on. They seem to have bought it. But get up now, we have to find a safe shelter."  
Petunia got up, her legs still shaky and exhausted from swimming.  
Harry looked over to his uncle and asked whether she wanted to bury them, but his aunt just flinched and then shook her head very vehemently. "We can't. If we bury them _they_ will know that someone survived. We cannot take that risk."

Together they scampered across the beach until they reached a forest. They explored the area until they found a patch of woods that was shielded by cliffs on two sides and the ocean bordering on the third side. There they decided that a big, old tree was going to be their best bet to defend them from _those people_ as well as any wild animals living on the island.  
The first hurdle in claiming the tree as their new home base was the fact that Petunia could not climb at all. Somehow, Harry had to manage getting up by himself – which was fairly easy for a small and agile kid like him – and then help pull his aunt up as well. They would have to work on her climbing skills if Petunia wanted to survive.  
Both were way too exhausted to think about anything else at this point and they quickly fell asleep.  
Their dreams were not happy ones though, gruesome pictures were haunting them, the dead faces of the other passengers staring at them with cold, dead eyes.  
Petunia was the first to wake up with her heart beating faster than it ever had, but Harry didn't take long either. They knew they wouldn't be able to sleep comfortably for a long while.  
While Harry was pondering his own thoughts and feelings, he didn't notice his aunt watching him very carefully.  
After a while, the sun was slowly rising and birds all around them were welcoming the new morning, she broke the silence between them.  
"Harry... I think it is time I tell you something very important. I've kept it a secret from you all those years, but I might not have another opportunity to tell you..." Harry looked up, confused. Petunia seemed almost embarrassed to have kept this secret, which baffled Harry quite a bit. Yet, he knew better than to interrupt her now. "This is going to sound really strange and unbelievable, Harry, but... you are a wizard. Just like your parents were."  
Harry's eyes widened in surprise. Disbelief and confusion, but also exhilaration could be seen in his face. Petunia tried to explain it to Harry in more detail: "Your parents' names were Lily and James. They went to a wizard school called Hogwarts. Shortly after your birth, an evil wizard called Voldemort killed them. No one knows why exactly you survived, but Dumbledore, the headmaster of Hogwarts, asked me to take care of you and to explain everything once you are old enough to understand. I thought now was as good as any moment to come clean, after all, we'll have to survive together."

Harry needed time to digest all of that information. At first, he thought it was a joke, but this wasn't exactly the best time for one and his aunt wasn't known for her great sense of humor either.  
After thinking everything through, he asked: "How do you know I'm a wizard? I mean, aren't there magic parents who have normal children?" "That does happen, yes, but haven't you experienced weird things when you were very scared or angry? Those were bursts of accidental magic, which are used to differentiate magical from non-magical children."  
Harry nodded. He remembered these strange situations he had found himself in over and over again very well.  
Another question burst out of the kid: "How do you learn to do magic?"  
"That's the point I wanted to get to. Usually, children start their Hogwarts career on the 1st of September after they turn eleven. You should have gone this year. But now we're stuck here. The only thing that could help you is probably this." Petunia took a watertight plastic bag out of the inner pocket of her jacket. In it was an old, worn journal.  
She gave it to Harry, who opened the first page.

The book was filled with his mother's neat handwriting. It was also full of technical terms about magic, which Harry didn't understand and Petunia couldn't explain either. She had carried the journal with her for years, because deep down she had still loved her sister, but she didn't know about the content of this journal.  
Harry tried to make sense of this book anyway.

The book was almost like a 'survival guide' for wizards. It contained advice on household charms and transformation, how to build houses or cook. But you needed a wand for all of these things and Harry did not have a wand.  
Towards the end of the journal, there were a few pages dedicated to wandless magic, which Harry was determined to teach himself. Luckily, he actually understood most of what her mother had written on that topic.  
He immediately wanted to try out his magic by learning the first technique in the book: making objects levitate.

While Harry was happily concentrating his magic on making small rocks and sticks float, his aunt climbed down the tree awkwardly and set off to find something edible. She quickly spotted some fruits and berries she recognized from her childhood, when Lily had dragged her off to join the girl scouts. This was the only good thing to ever come out of that horrible time in Petunia's life.

An hour or o later, Petunia returned to their tree with her hands full of berries. In the meantime, Harry had mastered the first exercise. It had been more exhausting than he had imagined, but bit by bit he had improved and now he could even safely levitate his aunt up into the tree branches. That cost him a lot of magic and afterwards he was out of breath.  
The two of them split the food and scarfed it down in record time.  
The berries wouldn't sate them for long though, and they knew they had to find a better long term solution.

After eating, Harry was determined to get the second exercise down as well. He was supposed to try changing the size of varying objects. It meant he had to be able to both shrink things and make them grow bigger. He really wanted to succeed, because the more control he had over his magic, the easier would it be to survive on this island.  
Maybe he could even find a way to escape this dreadful place.  
Even before the sun set, Harry had figured out how to expand little stones to twice their original size, but shrinking things was a lot harder and he simply couldn't do it. He'd have to try again in the morning, because Petunia ordered him to go to sleep while she herself would stay awake and keep watch.  
Harry was so worn out from all of the magic he'd performed that he fell asleep almost instantly. 


End file.
